​As the sun began to set, our camp site at Table Mountain Campground provided a spectacular view of the sun through the trees as it descended behind the mountains to the west. The location was perfect for the sunlight to kiss the scraggly plant life in the area just next to our campsite.

As I watched the sunset while sipping my coffee, a little creative inspiration came to me. What's more relaxing than a nice cup of coffee and a beautiful sunset when camping? And how can I combine the two right here?

I quickly grabbed a piece of firewood that intrigued me earlier and sat it on the ground with my coffee cup right on it. And with the camera low to the ground I created a couple photographs that I hoped would combine how I felt at that moment with what I saw.

After the sun had set and the littleman was in bed, we built the fire up a bit, and enjoyed some tea and s'mores. I took this time to relax a little bit more and set up to capture some photos of the night sky. Unfortunately, the moon was against me getting some great shots of the Milky Way, and our camping trip wasn't something I could've planned around the moon's phase, so I adapted and ended up with some photos I was proud of.

The light from the moon forced me to think and compose my shots in different ways which was good. I think that learning to adapt and make the most and best of any situation is a skill that is great to have no matter the situation.
​
Here are the night sky photos I was created during our camping trip.

This camping trip taught me a lot about raising a kid and about photography.  I love the photos I was able to create during the trip, and the memories that they depict are even more important to me.  I can't wait until our next camping adventure.  Until then though, there are a ton of other photographs to create and adventures to have.

Weddings are probably one of the most important days in anyone's life. Unfortunately things don't always go as planned with weddings. Sometimes it's things we have control over, other times it's not, but either way we can be disappointed and/or frustrated by whatever doesn't/didn't go as planned.

When one of my good friends reached out to me about editing her daughter's wedding photos, and explained to me the issue behind the request, I was more than happy to help.

Up to this point, I had been focused on family portraits, action sports, and nature photography, and had never shot or retouched a wedding; but having committed to shooting two weddings, I thought not only would I be able to help out my friends, but that it would also be a great learning experience for me.

Here are a few of the Original/Edited photos

​The Flower Project is focused on capturing the intrinsic beauty of flowers in both a natural and creative manner. The project grew out of another much larger photo project, and is really the result of two different influences, my mother love of roses and my wife's love of flowers.

In the fall/winter of 2014, I decided I would embark on a weekly/monthly photo project/challenge which would help me to grow as a photographer both in the creative and technical skills. During the project two of the themes, Nature and Macro, saw me seeking to use flowers for the daily challenge.

My wife would often get a bouquet of flowers every week at the grocery store to put in the kitchen, and often it was those flowers that became the subject for my photography. This along with my mother's love of roses, which I would try to photograph a unique way to give her prints of those photographs as a Christmas present, sort of morphed into The Flower Project you see on my portfolio page.

The Flower Project photos range the gamut from bright and airy, to cool and relaxing, to dramatic and melancholy; you'll also find that way the photos are taken are widely varied. The goal behind the project really is capture and present the flowers I find throughout my normal daily life in a way I find appealing. Sometimes the look of the flower sparks a creative idea for me to run with; other times, I have an idea of what I want or how I want to photograph the flower before; and yet other times, I'll see a flower just on the tree or in the garden and want to snap a quick photo of it. It's kind of a bit of everything.

The photos in the flower project are lit in few different ways.  The two predominate are natural light and off camera flash.  When using natural light, I tried to position the myself and the camera in a way that made the best use of the natural light as it lit the flower.  The times I opted for off camera flash, I typically had the flowers set up against a white background and the flash positioned in a way to best make use of the white background, and to add some texture and contrast to the photo.  Often the flash ends up over the flowers with the camera in front of them.

For the more creative shots you see, I utilized a few different techniques including adding textural overlays during post processing and using a broken mirror to photograph the reflection of the flowers.  On a few occasions, you'll see that I staged the flowers as if they were on some sort of table, either a dining or end table, in a house; these shots remind me almost more of a still life painting or some other sort of fine art piece hanging in a business or museum.

With the very broad sense of the project, I find that I'm constantly adding photos to the project. Not all of the photos have or will be added to the portfolio page, and there are some that totally forgotten to add the the project.

I think that as personal projects go, the broad and openness of this project allows me to do a lot with it, and to keep it pretty fresh.

So, what do you think?  Would you like to be able to purchase some prints of The Flower Project photos?  Would you be interested in a book or calendar of the photos?  I'd love to hear your opinions and thoughts, and would be greatly appreciative if you took a moment or two to leave a comment here.

You can see more photos of The Flower Project:
- In my portfolio, The Flower Project
- In my Gallery:  The Flower Project.  Here you can also purchase prints if you'd like.

Thanks!  And I hope you enjoy The Flower Project series as much as I do.